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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29011152">Help me hold onto you</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicClem/pseuds/MagicClem'>MagicClem</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Ready or Not (2019)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Daniel and Grace deserve the world, Developing Relationship, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Grace doesn't play hide and seek, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Infidelity</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 12:35:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>15,882</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29011152</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicClem/pseuds/MagicClem</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The day of her wedding night, Grace learns that her husband’s family has a weird tradition. At midnight, they celebrate the man who made their good fortune possible and they play a game in his honor. The game is generated at random by a strange little box. Grace will admit that she would rather do something else on her wedding night but if it’s what it takes to be officially part of this family in their minds, she will do it. </p><p>She gets Monopoly.</p><p>Or: Grace doesn't play hide and seek.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Alex Le Domas/Grace Le Domas, Daniel Le Domas/Grace Le Domas</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>176</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Help me hold onto you</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hey everyone! </p><p>I'm back with another fic for this movie. It's been a while but I'm still obsessed with it and this idea was in my head for a while. I'm glad I finally wrote it and I hope you guys will enjoy it!</p><p>(Title from "The Archer" by Taylor Swift)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The day of her wedding night, Grace learns that her husband’s family has a weird tradition. At midnight, they celebrate the man who made their good fortune possible and they play a game in his honor. The game is generated at random by a strange little box. Grace will admit that she would rather do something else on her wedding night but if it’s what it takes to be officially part of this family in their minds, she will do it. </p><p>She gets Monopoly. She hates this game, it’s the only game she always refused to play when she was younger. She tries to sabotage the game as best as she can so she can stop playing. It still lasts for two goddamn hours and she is more than happy when she is free to go back to perform more traditional activities of a wedding night. </p><hr/><p>The first year of marriage with Alex is the best year of her life. After their wonderful honeymoon, they move back to their New-York home. Alex goes back to work at his law firm and Grace goes back to work as well. As a Le Domas, she could never work again but she doesn’t like the idea of getting too involved with her new family when it comes to money. Alex makes a lot of money, enough to get them a beautiful flat in Manhattan and she likes her job. Teaching has always been Grace’s dream job. As a foster kid, school often felt like an escape from her shitty foster homes and some of the most helpful people in her childhood had been some of her teachers. They pushed her to work hard. It was a teacher who noticed the bruises on her arm when she was 10 and her foster dad was beating the kids he was in charge of. It was this teacher who fought with everything she had to make sure the children got out of there. She wants to be a teacher to be that person for children like her, lost and afraid and alone and needing a kind adult presence to guide them. </p><p>Alex still wants to stay away from his family and while she doesn’t want their money, she would like for them to <em> be </em> a family. She argues with him that they should visit more often and he indulges her but Alex chooses the occasions he agrees to do something with his family very meticulously. Most of the time, they do Christmas with the Le Domas, always arriving at the end of the afternoon on Christmas eve and leaving at the end of the afternoon on Christmas day. It’s not much but Becky is happy. Apparently, it’s an improvement compared to the previous years. </p><p>The one thing that really changes is how much they see Daniel. He also lives in the City so she is surprised that she barely saw him before but now that they are married, Alex invites him to dinner often or the three of them go out. Charity is never with them and it’s not that rare for Daniel to bring a “friend” with him even if he is not fooling anyone about the nature of those friendships. Grace doesn’t say a word to Daniel but when she tries to talk to Alex about it, he tells her not to worry about it. </p><p>“Daniel and Charity’s marriage isn’t our problem,” he says.</p><p>“He is your brother,” she points out. </p><p>“Yeah, and they know what they are doing. Trust me, Daniel isn’t doing anything to Charity that she doesn’t do to him.”</p><p>“He doesn’t look good.”</p><p>Alex shrugs. “Well, that’s Daniel, he is always like that.”</p><p>She doesn’t know how it’s supposed to make her feel better. Alright, so she isn’t enabling adultery because there is a high possibility that Charity and Daniel are both aware of the others' affairs and do not care. Probably because they don’t love each other, something that a blind person could see. It doesn’t stop Grace from worrying about Daniel and his very unhealthy coping mechanisms. Daniel is always drinking and he looks miserable most of the time. It surprises her that Alex isn’t more worried about that. </p><p>After their first year, something shifts with Alex. She doesn’t see it at first. It started so slowly that Grace isn’t sure when it began. Only that one day, Alex is kissing her goodbye before going to work, taking her to his favorite restaurants at least once a week, is attentive and kind, and suddenly, he withdraws from her. Suddenly, they don’t go out as much because Alex isn’t in the mood. He stays at work late, always arguing that he has a lot to work on. He is distracted, so much that even when he is with her, she feels like his mind is elsewhere. She tells him at first, but he blames it on work or family stuff. She doesn’t know if she believes him but after a while, she just stops asking. </p><p>If you ask her, she thinks it probably started when they started to talk about having children. They are both aware of the fact that they want to have children but never discuss this in detail before, which turns out to have been a huge mistake. The worst part is that they want the same thing so it should not be a problem but it is. Alex makes it pretty clear that he doesn’t just want children, he wants <em> biological </em> children. He tells her how important it is to him to have a child that is <em> his </em> , to continue the family line and it’s just how they do things in his family and he just wants it that way. Grace wants to <em> adopt </em> because she was one of those children in foster care once and she knows that she can’t take them all out of there but she thinks that if she could help a few, she would do some good in the world. Also, pregnancy sounds dreadful and she doesn’t want to experience it ever. It’s a huge never-ending fight because they can’t seem to find a middle ground. It’s not for lack of trying on her part, she offers alternative solutions (they could adopt to make her happy AND use a surrogate so they can have at least one biological child for example) but nothing pleases Alex unless it’s the very scenario he wants (so, her, pregnant with their child). She doesn’t understand it either, because he doesn’t have any good explanation as to why a surrogate is out of the question except that he “wants to keep strangers out of their family business”. That doesn’t make any sense to Grace: that stranger would just be around for 9 months and then disappear forever. All his arguments in favor of Grace being the one to carry the child are about the bond they would form and all things that are probably true if she <em> wanted </em> to be pregnant. And she tries to avoid the adoption topic as much as possible since that one time he told her that adoption wasn’t good enough for him because he wants to have children that are his “real” children. The first time he said that, Grace stopped the fight here and there and even Alex seemed to have realized that he crossed a line. It was like he just remembered that his wife was in foster care and that adoption had been her only real shot at having a family. But it doesn't change his mind and after a while, he doesn't even apologize for this kind of words. Mostly, this situation is so frustrating because they have so many solutions but nothing sticks. Alex is being stubborn and selfish about this and Grace is willing to find a middle ground but she refuses to give in on the pregnancy bit. So really, they are stuck in this circular discussion that won’t end. It’s an ouroboros in the form of a fight. Every time the subject is mentioned, they fight about it. Every time they fight Alex storms out and only comes home the next day. He doesn’t apologize for leaving in the middle of a fight and she doesn’t ask him too, because she fears that mentioning the fight will just start it all over again. They sit in silence, trying to pretend it never happened, trying to go back to being Alex and Grace, until they fight again later. But she knows those fights are bad and they create a distance between them and each fight makes the divide bigger. </p><p>One of those fights happens when Daniel is there. Usually, they avoid fighting in front of people, <em> especially family </em> but this time, they all get pretty drunk and Alex asks his brother if Charity and Daniel plan on having children. </p><p>“I don’t see the point,” Daniel says. “Emily already has two, no need for more Le Domas children.”</p><p>He’s trying to be humorous, Grace can tell, but it falls flat. </p><p>“They don’t have the Le Domas’ name,” Alex points out. </p><p>“Who the fuck cares about that?” Daniel says.</p><p>“I do. That’s why I want children but Grace doesn’t for some reasons.”</p><p>She notices the surprise on Daniel’s face but she doesn’t really register it because what Alex just said makes Grace angry. It’s blatantly not true and he knows it. “I want children.”</p><p>“Not really.”</p><p>“Adopted children are still your children.”</p><p>“But they would not be your children for real.”</p><p>She doesn’t even tell him it hurts her when he says that anymore because he knows and he doesn’t care. He just decides to be an asshole about it because he knows she won’t budge and he is not happy to not get his way here. And the fight starts until Alex storms out. Daniel is still there, which she obviously forgot and she feels so embarrassed that he had to witness this. </p><p>“I’m sorry,” she says. </p><p>“It’s alright,” Daniel says. His eyes are kind. “Does this happen often?”</p><p>She shrugs. “I don’t know, a couple of times every month.”</p><p>“He’ll be back soon.”</p><p>She laughs bitterly. “It will be a miracle if I see him before tomorrow morning.”</p><p>“And where does he go?” He asks, worried and confused. She is confused too, but for different reasons.</p><p>“I don’t know. Until right now, I honestly thought he was going to see you but clearly not. You didn’t even seem to know about it.”</p><p>“I didn’t.”</p><p>“I thought you and him were like best friends or something.”</p><p>“And I thought he didn’t care about the family,” Daniel says. There is something in his voice, Grace doesn’t know what. Disappointment maybe. Or surprise. Or worry. Grace can’t really pin it down. Maybe it’s a mix of all of those things. </p><p>The next time they fight about children, he leaves and comes back like he always does. This time, she asks him where he was. “At Daniel’s,” he says. She texts Daniel later to ask and he tells her he didn’t see Alex that night. </p><hr/><p>After that, things change more. She doesn’t know what exactly happened during this one fight to cause Alex to withdraw from her more but he does. He leaves his job at the law firm to start working with the family. That surprises her because when they met, Alex was estranged and told her point-blank that he had no intention to ever work for the family. Clearly, he changed his mind, which would be fine if she had been informed earlier. Instead, she finds out the day he quits and starts his new job. He tells her about it in passing like it was an afterthought, like <em> she </em>was an afterthought. When she asks him why he says:</p><p>“Someone will have to take care of the business when my father can’t. I love Daniel and Emily but they are a mess and the business would crumble if they were the one to lead.”</p><p>She doesn’t know what to say. It’s not the cruellest thing she ever heard and he is not wrong: the business would burn if Emily was the one in charge and she has the feeling that Daniel would willingly start the fire himself if he was. But there is something so cold, so detached about the way he says it, it makes her skin crawl. This sounds so different from the kind and loving Alex she met in a bar a few years ago. </p><p>Then, they get more involved with the family, which makes sense really. He works for them and is spending a lot of time with his father to learn everything he needs to know to become the heir of the company. So it makes sense when Alex starts to want to spend more time with the family as a whole. He will invite his parents to dinner. Or he will host a dinner party with Daniel and Charity. Or they will go to lunch with Finch, Emily and the little demons they call children (Grace likes children but Emily’s kids are the most annoying she has ever met). She doesn’t love it but she doesn’t mind. She doesn’t mind even if she feels Tony’s contempt every time he looks at her, even if she feels Becky growing cold with her (it’s like she knows Alex feels that way about her and acts accordingly). She doesn’t mind, even if Charity is passive-aggressive the whole time and Daniel drinks so much that Grace wonders how he isn’t in a coma yet. She doesn’t mind, even if Finch is a jerk who thinks he is the best guy ever, even if Emily is high the whole time and even if those children never fail to ruin her clothes. She doesn’t mind because they are Alex’s family and she wants him to have a relationship with them. But she can’t help the feeling that the more time they spend with them, the more Alex distances himself from her.</p><p>Then, he starts to mention his family hosting weekend gatherings at the family estate. It honestly sounds like hell but Alex tells her she shouldn’t come anyway, it will be dreadfully boring and she won’t like it. A part of her is angry because she doesn’t like to feel excluded, to feel like Alex doesn’t want her around. But mostly, she is relieved, because the idea of spending a whole week-end pretending that everything is perfect between them sounds terrible. It’s better to stay alone in her flat, watching Netflix and eating whatever terrible food she can get. </p><p>After three of those week-ends on her own, she is surprised when someone knocks on her door. She opens only to see Daniel.</p><p>“Don’t you have that family thing?”</p><p>“You are never there,” Daniel points out.</p><p>“Alex doesn’t want me to go. He said I wouldn’t like it.”</p><p>“I mean, it’s terrible so he has a point.”</p><p>“What are you doing here?”</p><p>“I have an emergency at the company so I couldn’t make it.”</p><p>“An emergency?”</p><p>“It’s not real, I just thought we should spend time together. Those family’s reunions are not my cup of tea either.”</p><p>She invites him in with a smile.</p><p>“Don’t you work for your family?”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>“Then they must know the emergency is fake.”</p><p>“Oh, completely but they don’t care about me enough to drag me to those. Especially not now that Alex is back.”</p><p>There is disgust in his voice when he talks about Alex being back and she doesn’t comment on that. Instead, she takes out the alcohol and they watch a dumb movie together and fall asleep snuggled against each other on the couch. </p><p>It becomes a thing. When there is a family thing, Alex leaves her and Daniel comes by. Sometimes they go out to eat and watch a movie. Sometimes they go to a bar or a club. Sometimes they do something more special like an escape room or a conference. Sometimes they stay in, order a pizza and watch garbage on tv. Sometimes she has work to do and he reads a book next to her. Sometimes they both read a book on the couch, her legs on his laps. It’s terribly domestic the way they are with each other and she would lie if she said that she was indifferent to it. She would lie if she said she was indifferent to Daniel. He is handsome and funny and smart, he watches garbage tv with her but he also watches intellectual stuff and will debate her in earnest. He takes her to a museum because there is an exhibit he wants to show her and he shares his passion with her. He opens up to her. She notices he drinks less when it’s just the two of them together. When she asks him why he says it’s because spending time with her doesn’t feel like a chore and he likes to know what he is doing with her. It is so simple to be with him and to joke with him and to simply <em>exist </em>with him. It never felt that easy to be with someone else, not even Alex. She would lie if she said she was not more in love with Daniel than she was with Alex at this point. </p><p>But the thing is, Grace is really good at lying to herself. </p><hr/><p>She met Alex through common friends. The first thing she thought was that he was dashingly handsome. He had shyly offered to buy her a drink. It took her a while to realize that Alex wasn’t shy. When she told him about it, he laughed and said:</p><p>“You are just the most stunning woman I have ever met. I was intimidated."</p><p>And really, she couldn’t argue with him when he was being so sweet. </p><p>Their relationship was passionate and moved fast. Three months after they started dating, they moved in together. They didn’t plan to do it so quickly but her lease was ending and Alex offered and sure, it was crazy but it felt right. That’s how she would define their first year together: it was fast but it was right. He made her smile and he made her feel safe. </p><p>She knew he had a complicated relationship with his family. He never got into the details of it all, they were very rich and the expectations were huge and they were terrible people. Alex talked about his parents and his aunt Helen with nothing but contempt, his brother-in-law was an idiot. He talked about his sister kindly but there was a form of condescension about it like he thought she was sweet but stupid. He talked about his sister-in-law with a tiny bit of warmth mixed with anger: he thought she didn’t treat his brother right (even if he thought the opposite was also true) but he also thought she had a dry wit and a good sense of humor. And he clearly loved Daniel, even if he would talk a lot about all his problems and what a fuck-up he was (he didn’t say it so bluntly, but the idea was there). But mostly, he did not talk about his family and overall, it felt like he resented being a Le Domas. </p><p>Alex was bigger than life, it’s like his love was so big that he couldn’t contain it to himself. He loved grand gestures and romantic surprises. He looked so happy with himself that she never had the heart to tell him that he should chill a bit. She didn’t love the attention, but she did love the fact that someone loved her enough to take the time and effort to do those things for her. She loved them not because she liked this kind of gesture but because Alex was doing it for her and that made it great. </p><p>After a year, they talked about marriage. He was not into the idea at first but she really wanted to get married and she told him as much. He wanted to be a modern couple who doesn’t get married and she can understand why he would have felt that way, he who came from an old traditional family. But for her marriage was about stability, the kind she longed for as a child. Maybe she could have changed her mind eventually if he had told her that marriage was impossible for him for any good reasons, but ultimately, he changed his mind rather quickly about it. He proposed the way he did everything, with a big grand gesture and she said yes. </p><p>When she met his family, she realized that Alex had been partially right about the family: his dad and aunt were jerks, Finch was an imbecile and his sister was sweet but stupid. But she wouldn't agree on everything he told her: his mom was kind to her and really nothing like Alex’s dad and Grace thought Charity was cold and arrogant. Daniel had been a mix between the two: he wasn’t bad and she could have fun in his presence, he was indeed a mess and he had a tendency to flirt with her when he was drunk, howbeit not in a way that made her truly uncomfortable. It was mostly annoying really. She supposed that’s how a family is supposed to work: some people you like and some you don’t and just have to tolerate. </p><p>And quite frankly, it felt like she didn’t have to make much effort to tolerate them because Alex was trying to keep them away from her, at first by removing the family from their life, and then by removing Grace from the family. It was like there was something that prevented her from being a real family member. In the beginning, it felt like a good thing, because Alex was removing himself as well. They were their own little family of two but then, something changed and it's all about their fight over children. That’s how it all started, how they started to part away and how he got closer to his family. She would have expected him to get closer to Daniel since she believed them to be each other's favorite family member but it felt like it’s the opposite: the closer to the family he got, the further away from Daniel he was. And in retrospect, it made sense: Daniel hated the family just as much as Alex used to, even if he never got away from them the way his brother did. Of course Daniel would not understand Alex’s obsession with biological children and want to continue the line. </p><p>Grace maybe should just ask for a divorce herself because it feels like Alex, despite looking like he barely tolerates her presence anymore, doesn’t seem to be looking for this. But Grace is maybe too optimistic about this. She thinks they can fix this, somehow, if they try. They could try couple therapy or something. They could save this. Because yes, Alex changed a lot in a few years but she would not mind if he let her be a part of it. That’s all she wants really. To belong somewhere. To belong with him, the man she loves, her husband. </p><hr/><p>They have been married for a little more than 4 years now and it’s Christmas. Unlike the first year, they decide to stay the week with the family and by they she means “Alex”, he is the one who decides this. She would complain about it but really, her options are this or spending time with Alex alone and that’s not really a good plan either. Like every year, Christmas is at the family estate, the place where Alex and Grace got married. The place still feels big and cold to Grace, like she doesn’t belong there. </p><p>Becky is over the moon when they say they will spend the whole week with them. She thanks Grace on the phone for “bringing Alex back to them” but Grace doesn’t think she has anything to do with it. Alex did it all by himself when he started to go to those family weekends, when he quit his law firm to work for the family company and when he decided to exclude her from all of this. </p><p>She would lie if she said it didn’t hurt. It does because she married him 4 years ago and he used to be sweet and gentle and kind and open. He feels like a completely different person now and she doesn’t like who this stranger is. Alex now is cold and distant. She has been thinking about marriage counselling for a while, knowing that they need to do something about their marriage or it’s going to end in divorce. Even though she’ll admit, maybe divorce wouldn’t be so bad if Alex continues to act as he does. She is better off alone than with such a husband and such a family, who greets her with fake smiles and familiarities but never makes any effort to include her in anything, even when she is <em>right here</em>. Thank God for Daniel, the only one treating her like a person and who seems to genuinely enjoy her company. </p><p>On the 23rd, she is talking with Daniel when he tells her he knows how to play the piano. She is very surprised by the information and begs him to show her his musical skills. They have a back and forth, where he tells her he isn’t very good and he hasn’t played in a while and she argues that it doesn’t matter and she wants to hear him play. Ultimately, she wins. They go to the music room and she teases him about how normal it is to have one in a house, something she told Alex on their wedding night. Daniel laughs and opens the door and then freezes. Grace wonders why until she looks into the room and then she freezes as well. </p><p>Inside there is Alex and Charity. Charity is sitting on a table, kissing Alex, who is kissing her back just as passionately. Charity’s dress is up on her thighs and Alex’s shirt is partially open and out of his pants. Their kiss is heated and one of Alex’s hands is in between her legs. It’s not the worst she could have seen but it’s impossible to mistake it for anything else. Alex and Charity take a second to notice them and when they do, they jump apart, as if it would stop Grace or Daniel to see what they just witnessed. </p><p>Grace is angry, no, it’s not strong enough, she is furious. She is so enraged that she can’t even move or speak or do anything really. She feels rage running through her veins, anger burning her entire body and she can’t even say a word. She sees Daniel, his face is red and distorted with anger but thankfully, he isn’t paralyzed by it.</p><p>“What the fuck?”</p><p>Alex has the decency to look ashamed, even if it’s probably more shame for being caught then shame for doing it in the first place. Charity doesn’t look guilty at all.</p><p>“Get over yourself,” she says, “it’s not a secret between us that we have our own relationships outside of our marriage.”</p><p>“I know that,” Daniel says. “The problem isn’t what you are doing, it’s WHO you are doing it with! IT’S MY BROTHER!” He looks at Alex, who tries to say something but Daniel doesn’t let him. “I don’t even want to talk to you right now.”</p><p>He storms off, leaving her alone. She doesn’t blame him, he looks ready to punch someone. Alex goes to her and says “Grace, darling, it’s not what it looks like…” </p><p>She doesn’t listen to the rest, wondering if he thinks she is that stupid. It’s not even that she didn’t suspect he might be cheating on her because she did. Of course, she did, how could she not when he leaves her alone, comes home late, is distant and looks at her like she is an inconvenience. She imagined that he went out in clubs to find some random girl who would not care to see the ring on his finger, to have a brief moment with them. Or a woman he works with and who he takes to dinner and to expensive hotels. Those images hurt her but they have something to it that this situation doesn’t. Cheating on her is terrible, doing it with his brother’s wife (no matter the terrible marriage Charity and Daniel have) is so selfish she couldn’t even think about it if someone had told her to imagine all the possibilities. This is beyond what she believed Alex was capable of. He tries to reach out to her but she takes a step back.</p><p>“Don’t fucking touch me,” she says and then, just like Daniel did a minute before, she storms out. </p><p>She is hurt. It’s strange to be so hurt when a part of her knows she fell out of love with him a long time ago. But it hurts to think that while she was thinking about ways to fix their relationship, he was out there fucking his <em> sister in law </em>. It hurts to see that he clearly gave up on them a long time ago and she is the idiot staying with him for some reasons. She is angry, so angry that she could break something but she doesn’t do that. Instead, she goes around this ridiculously giant house and tries to find Daniel. She finds him in the study, having a drink. Good, she needs one as well. Without a word, she takes one and sits next to him. </p><p>After a moment of silence, she says, “I’m sorry.”</p><p>“For what? It’s not your fault.”</p><p>“I know, it’s just... It’s your brother. And your wife. This sucks.”</p><p>“Yeah. Well, I’m sorry too. He is your husband after all.”</p><p>“I’m so angry at him,” she says. “But I’m angrier at myself. For staying instead of handing him divorce papers years ago. Would have saved me some trouble.”</p><p>“Yeah, but you know, divorce isn’t really something this family does.”</p><p>“Why is that?”</p><p>He looks at her perplexed. “You know, with the deal and all.”</p><p>She is confused. “What are you talking about?”</p><p>There is a long pause. She is looking at him, trying to understand what he means. He is looking at her, with a confused look that suddenly turns into realization and shock. “He never told you,” he says more for himself than for her. “All those years and he never told you.”</p><p>“Told me? What are you talking about Daniel?”</p><p>He looks at her, empties his glass of whiskey all at once and says “Do you remember that story the night of your wedding? About Le Bail helping our family and the box and all that?”</p><p>“Yeah, of course.”</p><p>“Well, there is more to that story.”</p><p>He tells her then, about how the family believes Le Bail is the devil and his help is more a deal with the devil and how the game during the wedding night is kind of a “signing your soul away to the devil” situation and how there is this one bad card that if you get it, the family will murder you. She listens to all of it and then she laughs. </p><p>“You can’t be serious,” she says. He doesn’t say anything else but he looks so serious that Grace’s laughter dies. “You can’t be serious right?”</p><p>He gets up and offers her his hand. She takes it and follows him. They arrive in what looks like a barn. She notices a few goats and she feels something twist in her stomach. </p><p>“When I was a kid,” Daniel says, “aunt Helen got married to this guy, Charles. He was nice I suppose but I never really met him before the wedding. At the time, Helen was estranged from us. The night of the wedding, he had to play a game. I was not supposed to participate because I was too young but Alex and I got curious so we sneaked out of our room to go see what was happening. He got Hide and Seek. The wrong one. The whole family had weapons and tracked him down. Alex and I got scared and I tried to protect him so I hid him in a closet. Charles found me and asked me to help him but I didn’t. I called the others. My mom told me she was proud of me and they took him in the game room. I was not allowed to go in yet, but he didn’t get out of there alive. And they took him here.”</p><p>He opens some sort of door. The first thing Grace notices is the smell. It’s nauseating and she instinctively puts her hand on her mouth, almost throwing up. Daniel gets his phone out and puts the flashlight on. She gets closer and looks inside. Mostly, it’s rotten bodies of what she assumes are goats. And there is a body. A human body. She takes a step back, her hand on her mouth again but this time it’s to stop herself from screaming. Daniel closes the door again and looks at her. He looks like he expects her to insult him or tell him he is a monster or something similar. She won't say anything like that. </p><p>“We should call the police.”</p><p>“It’s pointless,” Daniel says. “Even if they find the body, my family will just pay off whoever is in charge and suddenly, all the pieces of evidence are gone.”</p><p>And she wants to argue with that, but she knows he is right and she knows she can’t do this right now. </p><p>“But that deal with the devil, it’s still insane! They just kill innocent people for no reasons.”</p><p>“I don’t think it’s bullshit,” Daniel says. “I know it’s insane but every family member who refuses to respect the rules died. We’ve all seen it: someone elopes with their significant other and they are dead the next day. And even if it was bullshit, it doesn’t matter. It’s why no one in my family divorces their spouse. This is what will always bind us together. That secret.”</p><p>“And so what, I just stay with a man I don’t love and who doesn’t love me? I stay miserable all my life? Because I can’t do that, I can’t stay here, not with him and not after what you just told me.”</p><p>He stays silent for a moment and then his face lights up like he just figured it out.</p><p>“You ask for a divorce.”</p><p>“You just said…”</p><p>“I just said that no one leaves because we are all tied by this secret. But you don’t know anything. Alex never told you and who else would have told you the truth?”</p><p>She looks at him, understanding what he is doing and she nods. </p><p>“No one had any reason to tell me anything.”</p><p>“Exactly. You ask for a divorce and you ask for nothing. No money, nothing.”</p><p>“Why?”</p><p>“Maybe it will be enough to consider you out of the family in Le Bail’s eye?”</p><p>“It’s bullshit Daniel!”</p><p>“But what if it’s not? Then what?”</p><p>She thinks about it. It’s bullshit, she refuses to believe otherwise. But Daniel’s eyes are full of fear and he believes this, he believes it so strongly that a part of her can’t help but wonder <em>What if he is right and this is completely real</em>. Does Le Bail consider her soul his now that she got married or the fact that she didn’t know makes her “deal” incomplete? Is consent necessary when signing your soul away to the devil? She would need to look into it but it doesn’t matter really. She doesn’t want Alex’s money. He can keep it, he can keep his fancy apartment and his blood money and she doesn’t want anything from him. </p><p>“Ok,” she says. </p><p>She is about to go back inside but she stops herself and she turns to Daniel.</p><p>“What would you have done if I picked the wrong card?”</p><p>“I like to believe I would have helped you,” he says. “I don’t know if I’m brave enough to do it, but I want to believe I would have.”</p><p>She smiles, goes back to him and kisses his cheek. “I think you would have. Thank you, Daniel.”</p><p>She goes back to her room and starts packing. Alex arrives in the room when she is almost done and begs her to listen to him. She doesn’t listen.</p><p>“I’m leaving,” she says. “I’m gonna call a cab here and I’m going back to New York and I’m taking my things out of our apartment and I’m leaving.”</p><p>“What are you saying, Grace?”</p><p>She takes her ring off. “I want a divorce.”</p><hr/><p>She spends Christmas Eve and Christmas on her own, in their apartment, packing everything. Alex tries to call her but after the third time, she turns her phone off. If he really wants to talk to her, he can come back to New York and do it in person. Not that she would listen anyway. </p><p>Packing is exhausting. She takes time to sort out everything, leaving the fancy clothes Alex gave her and that she will never have to wear again, having to go through their bookshelves to take her books… By the end of Christmas day, she is done. She turns her phone back on. She has a few voicemails from Alex and a thousand texts. Nothing from Daniel and she can’t help but be disappointed. She opens the texts and they all say the same things, that he is sorry and that they can fix it and that he knows he has been distant lately but they can work through it. She erases them all and she does the same with the voicemails, without even bothering listening to them. She thinks that if it had been anyone else, she would be willing to make the effort but the fact that of all the people in the world, he chose <em> Charity</em>, she can’t get over that. </p><p>On the 26th, she looks into her phone, trying to decide which friends of her she could call. Most of her friends are also Alex’s and asking them for help seems like a dangerous move. What if they end up taking his side and not hers. Ultimately, she calls Clara, a colleague who is also a good friend and most importantly, <em> her </em>friend. Clara lives with her wife Sarah in Brooklyn and even better for Grace, they have a spare room that they use as an office and a guest room (but Grace knows that they bought this flat knowing that the spare room would eventually become a child’s bedroom). She doesn’t explain the whole situation, just that she left Alex and that she needs a place to crash for a couple of months until she finds her own place. Clara is very understanding about the whole thing and tells her that she never liked Alex and that she is more than welcome to stay with them for a while. That night, they drink while she tells them the full story (minus the alleged deal with the devil). It’s very liberating to be able to insult him. </p><p>She contacts a lawyer to help her with the divorce. The lawyer doesn’t understand why she is not trying to get money out of him, especially since they didn’t sign a prenup and that he did cheat on her. She tells the lawyer that she doesn’t want to own him anything and that she is capable of taking care of herself just fine. She is glad that Alex and she never shared a bank account because it makes it so much easier. In the end, the only thing Grace asks of Alex is for him to pay her lawyer fees, something she feels is more than fair considering that she wouldn’t even need one if it wasn’t for him. They go back and forth for months on this, Alex trying to block the divorce while she doesn’t change her position once. She wants a divorce and she wants nothing from him. </p><p>It takes so long that she has time to find her own apartment. Of course, on a teacher salary, she doesn’t get the best place ever but it's not too bad either. It’s in Brooklyn, just not the best part. It’s on the ground floor and she spends some money making sure that her door and her windows are secured because of that. There is a small bathroom where she barely fits on her own. The kitchen is open on the living space but it’s actually not a bad thing because the kitchen area and the living area are separated by a small kitchen island, which means she doesn’t have to buy a table. She has enough room for a small couch, a tv and bookshelves. She even has space for the plants she took from her old apartment. Finally, there is a bedroom, even if she feels generous to call it a bedroom because she has barely enough space for a bed and a small wardrobe. It’s clearly a downsize compared to the place she shared with Alex but she feels at home in a way she never did before. </p><p>After six months, Alex finally accepts to sign the divorce paper but he wants a meeting with her to do so. Grace accepts because she really doesn’t want to go to court over this and if it’s what it takes for him to sign, it’s fine. Of course, when they do meet, he asks her a thousand times if she is sure that’s what she wants and that they can make it work but she tells him to just sign the damn papers and in the end, he does. She doesn’t even tell him goodbye. Once it’s done, she leaves with her lawyer. They shake hands while he tells her that once again, she could have gotten a lot more money if she had just asked. She just smiles and tells him goodbye. </p><hr/><p>During all this time, she doesn't hear anything from Daniel and honestly, it hurts a lot more than the divorce. She knows he is probably not going to leave Charity considering what he told her but that breaks her heart. He deserves better than staying with someone he doesn’t love. She tried to contact him once during the divorce but he told her it was better if they didn’t see each other again, considering everything. </p><p>She misses him though. She misses him a lot. She misses his smile and she misses his dry sense of humor and she misses their conversations. She thinks they should still see each other because they are friends but she starts to realize that Daniel has a tendency of self-sabotage. Well, she always knew that, it’s pretty obvious considering his behavior with his family and his alcoholism. But now that he told her about his family and their fucked up satanist beliefs and that one night when he was a kid, she understands why. He clearly feels guilty about the whole thing, feeling like he could have helped and maybe even saved this man. He probably feels like he is a terrible person because of this and that he doesn’t deserve good things as a result. He probably feels like this miserable life he forces himself into is what he deserves. She wishes she could hug him and tell him it’s not his fault, that he was a <em> child</em>, not old enough to see what they did to him and not old enough to understand what was happening. She can’t hug him because he is not here but she takes her phone out and texts him instead. </p><p>
  <em> Just wanted you to know that I have a new home. It’s smaller but it’s nice. [send location] </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Thank you for telling me the truth.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I hope you know it wasn’t your fault what happened that night. You were just a kid and you shouldn’t beat yourself up for it.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I guess I just miss you.  </em>
</p><p>He doesn’t text her back. </p><hr/><p>She starts to take the habit of texting him often. It’s never anything really fascinating and he never answers but it makes her feel happy. It's almost like he is still her friend. </p><p>
  <em> I bought a new plant today. It’s a cactus and isn’t he the cutest? I need a name. Any ideas?  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Some kid today drove me insane. I shouldn’t say this but sometimes, I kinda wish that punching kids was legal, some definitely deserve it.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Why do I have to be an adult and grade my students when I could play video games all day? Life is very unfair. </em>
</p><p><em> Remember that book you recommended me forever ago, </em> The Song of Achilles <em> ? Well, I finally finished it and I may have cried a little bit at the end. It was amazing, thank you for the rec! </em></p><p>
  <em> I don’t know how they found out that it was my birthday, but the kids gave me flowers and sang to me. I really love this job.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> This year again, some of my colleagues are planning a trip to Disney World in Florida and yet again, I can’t go. Why is it so expensive and why are teachers paid so badly?  </em>
</p><p>She wishes he would respond. He doesn’t have to text her a novel-length message, he could text her an emoji and she would be happy. At least she would know he is still thinking about her because really, she can’t stop thinking about him. </p><p>She is alone on a Friday night. She used to go out more before Alex but now it’s different. Most of her old friends were also Alex’s and when the time came to pick a side, they chose him. The fact that he is super-rich and always pays for people when they go out probably had a lot to do with that or maybe they just liked him best and could forgive him for how he treated her. Grace doesn’t know and doesn’t really care quite frankly. She has better things to do than being heartbroken over assholes preferring the jerk who cheated on her with his sister in law. The friends she still has are either a bit older than her and already done with the “going out on Friday night” lifestyle. The few friends who took her side are the “boring” ones who never liked going out in the first place. And Grace isn’t desperate enough to go to a bar alone. She doesn’t really want to honestly. </p><p>She is incredibly bored. She played <em> Detroit: Become Human </em> but she got bored. The game is great, she is just not in the mood. She tried to watch TV but nothing interesting or fun is on. She is just so incredibly bored. It reminds her of those nights where Alex left her to go to his family reunions (or whatever it was that he was doing) and she had to stay alone. And being reminded of this reminds her of Daniel, who would spend time with her during those moments. She misses him. It’s not fair that she lost one of her closest friends, someone she cared about deeply, someone she was in love with (it’s easier to admit it now that she is single) because of Alex. It's like he had to ruin everything in her life, even after leaving it. </p><p>It’s because she misses him that she takes her computer and starts looking into the logistics of deals with the devil. She still doesn’t believe it’s true, there is no way it is, but she knows he does believe it's real. There are a lot of sources and as expected, a lot of contradictory information because this is dumb and fake. But if she reads enough sources, some stuff comes back a lot. First of all, a deal with the devil is a pack between two consensual parties. In other words, you can’t trick someone into signing their soul away by not telling them what they are signing. Which means that if it’s real, she was never at risk because she didn’t know. She can’t help but feels somewhat relieved when she sees it. Of course, it’s bullshit, but there is still a part of her brain that can’t help but think “what if”. She learns that the devil doesn’t like to be played with, which is really unsurprising. She also learns that it’s not possible to break a contract if you were the one signing it but it’s possible if you are a descendant of the signer. There seems to be a lot of material from different websites explaining the intricate logistics of pacts with a demon and she gets sucked into the subject, reading pages after pages after pages. She thinks she understands this better but at the end of it, she mostly did a lot of reading about something she doesn’t believe in because she misses a guy who does. She is ridiculous. She texts him again, not expecting an answer.</p><p>
  <em> I just spend way too much time reading about deals with the devil for someone who believes it’s complete and utter bullshit.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> It’s dumb really, I was thinking about you and so I started looking into this because you do believe in all this crap.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Sometimes, I can’t help but wonder if it’s real and if I accidentally sold my soul to the devil by marrying your brother. Then I remember it’s bullshit but you know, it scared me for a hot second.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> The weird thing is, despite everything, despite the lies, the heartbreak, the humiliation of being cheated on and the possibility of having sold my soul to the devil, I can’t bring myself to regret any of what happened. I can’t bring myself to regret meeting Alex and everything that came after it because it led me to you. And I don’t think I could ever regret meeting you. All the pain feels like it was worth it in the end, because we got to be each other friends. Maybe more.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I don’t even know what I’m saying. I just miss you.  </em>
</p><hr/><p>She doesn’t remember falling asleep. She was watching some Netflix show she has seen a thousand times already and she fell asleep on her couch. She most likely wouldn’t have woken up until morning if it wasn’t for someone buzzing her appartement. She looks at the time. It’s one in the morning, who comes to visit someone at one in the morning? It’s probably some drunk person who has the wrong address. It happens sometimes and most of the time, those people are so sure they are at the right place that they won’t give up until she tells them off. She reluctantly gets up and answers the interphone. </p><p>“Hello,” she says. No one answers. Ok, so it must have been some prank from some dumb college kid. She puts the intercom down and decides to go to sleep because it’s late and her bed is far more comfortable than her couch but then, it buzzes again. She takes it off and aggressively says “WHAT?”</p><p>There is silence for a second or two and then a word. “Hi.”</p><p>Grace freezes and her anger leaves as quickly as it arrived. “Daniel?”</p><p>“Sorry, it was stupid, it’s really late, I shouldn’t have…”</p><p>“NO,” she says a bit too passionately. If she lets him leave now she doesn’t know when he will contact her again. “I’ll buzz you in.”</p><p>She does and opens her door for him right away. He enters the building, looking around, not knowing where to go and then, his eyes land on her and her heart misses a beat. God she really missed him. He goes to her and stops in front of her, leaving some distance between them, like he is afraid of getting too close. </p><p>“Hi,” he says and he sounds strangely shy and unsure, which is out of character for him. </p><p>“Hi,” she says. She must not look really happy. It’s the surprise really, she just can’t believe that after all this time he is standing right here. He must not see it that way.</p><p>“I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me, I shouldn’t have come.”</p><p>It looks like he is about to turn around and she won’t have that. She catches his wrist and says “it’s fine. I’m so glad to see you.”</p><p>“You are?”</p><p>“Yeah,” she says and she can feel herself smiling. “Please come in.”</p><p>He hesitantly takes a step in. </p><p>He stands awkwardly in her apartment. She gets it though, she feels slightly uncomfortable as well. Uncomfortable may not be the right word. She feels strange, awake and unsure, in a situation she is not prepared for and has no idea how to navigate. There is something in the air between them, it’s so thick she could almost taste it. </p><p>“Your place is nice,” he says.</p><p>“Thanks. How did you know I live here?”</p><p>“You send me the address,” he reminds her. “In the first text you send me.”</p><p>Right, she forgot about that. She feels very pleased with the idea that he kept it even though it was months ago like he was always planning to come here eventually. Like this moment was inevitable. Maybe it was. </p><p>“Right. Do you want something to drink or…”</p><p>“What did you mean?” She looks at him confused so he gets closer to her and adds: “In your text. You said we were friends. Maybe more. What did you mean?”</p><p>She feels herself blushing, her breath getting heavier. He is so close she could touch him so easily. She looks at his lips for a second and then, she looks at his eyes. He is looking at her lips too. The tension is so electric that Grace is almost scared of saying something that might break it. </p><p>“I think you know what I meant. You would not be here if you didn’t,” she whispers, so softly that she wonders if he is going to hear her.</p><p>“Yeah, I think you’re right,” he says just as quietly.</p><p>He makes the final move. He crosses the final distance between them and he kisses her. His lips are soft, his kiss gentle yet hungry for more and Grace kisses him back just as hungrily. She has wanted this for so long, she almost can’t remember a time when she didn’t want him. She deepens the kiss and he lets her, kissing her with the same fervor. It’s only when she tries to take his jacket off that he stops the kiss. Grace would be embarrassed by the needy sound that comes out of her mouth when he does if it was not him in front of her. </p><p>“It’s not a good idea,” he says, “we shouldn’t…”</p><p>And he is right, of course, he is right. He is married, even if his marriage is all but a sham at this point. She was married to his brother and it feels sort of hypocritical to do anything with Daniel when the nail in the coffin of her own marriage was Alex sleeping with Daniel’s wife. And sleeping with your ex-brother-in-law would be considered a pretty shitty move by most people. All of that is very true but…</p><p>“I don’t give a fuck,” Grace says.</p><p>“Oh thank God,” he says and he leans back in to kiss her. This time it’s not soft at all, it’s all hunger and passion. He pushes her against the nearest wall, touching her everywhere he can and she feels herself being set on fire everywhere his hands pass. He grabs her and she instinctively puts her legs around his waist. </p><p>“Take me to bed,” she manages to say in between kisses and he does. </p><p>They lay down naked in her bed later that night. Her head is on his chest, listening to the beating of his heart and he is softly playing with her hair. She feels so content, so at peace and Grace thinks this is what happiness feels like. She could stay in this moment for the rest of her life. An unrealistic aspiration for sure because they both know that eventually, they will have to come back to reality and truly, what a dreadful fact that is. Life is messy and complicated while this moment is pretty much perfect. Right now, it’s all about who will talk first and break the magic. They have been lying here for a while, hours maybe, she completely lost track of time. Eventually, Daniel talks:</p><p>“I should go.”</p><p>“You should stay,” she says and she knows it’s not rational, they have their own life, he is <em> married </em> and he has responsibilities with his satan worshipping family. But she wants him to stay with her, forever if possible. If he leaves, she won’t see him again. She knows it because he will probably think this was a mistake and he will block her number to make sure this never happens again. Or worse, he will think it’s a mistake but decide to continue anyway and he will come back to her for a moment before leaving her again. The idea of this sounds so much more terrible, having fragments of him that constantly slips away from her. And the worst part is, she would let him because she would rather have this tiny piece of him and nothing more, feel this peace when she is in his arms than not having it again. But none of those options will make her happy: it’s either lose him now forever or you get to keep him but it’s only going to be stolen kisses and stolen moments. She doesn’t want to accept those as her only two options. </p><p>“You know I can’t.”</p><p>She knows that. “Why?” she still stays, if only to make him speak, if only to make him stay a minute longer and she knows he will entertain her because she knows he doesn’t want to leave either.</p><p>“I’m married,” he says.</p><p>“You don’t even love her.”</p><p>“I’m still married.”</p><p>“Then get a divorce.” </p><p>“Grace…” he says. He doesn’t say more but she knows what he is going to say. </p><p>“It’s bullshit, Daniel. But even if it wasn’t you could still leave.”</p><p>“How?”</p><p>Well, at least spending hours researching this crap is going to be useful. “Well, first of all, it has to be consensual, a pact with the devil. You can’t trick someone into signing by not telling them what they are signing for.”</p><p>“So you’re safe?” he says and she hates how relieved he sounds. She nods and he kisses her temple. </p><p>“It’s also a two parties exchange: you give something and you get something. If you don’t respect those conditions, then you get punished. You said you had family members die because they didn’t respect the rules, right?”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>“Well, I bet none of them cut the family and most importantly, the family’s money off. They wanted the reward but refused to pay the price.”</p><p>Daniel is silent for a moment and then says: “Yeah, you’re right, they weren’t cut off.”</p><p>Grace nods and continues. “When you are the one signing your soul away, you can’t take it back. But when you are the descendant of said person, it’s a bit more complex. According to too many articles I read online, you could just break it off. You just have to give up the prize.”</p><p>“What are you saying?”</p><p>“That if you cut your family off and refuse all their money, you basically cut your contract. It means that you have to abandon everything that you have because of your family like I don’t know, you’re probably gigantic apartment, your high paying job, your probably-more-expensive-than-my-rent suits… And then you’re free. You can leave Charity. You can do whatever you want.” <em> You can be with me </em> she wants to say but she doesn’t.</p><p>“I think it’s too late for me.”</p><p>“Why? Because of what you did as a child? It wasn’t your fault, did you even know about all of this back then?”</p><p>He doesn’t speak but he shakes his head. She notices his eyes are slightly wet. </p><p>“Why would I get a second chance?”</p><p>“Because you are a good person,” she says and she sounds so sure, she hopes he hears that certainty in her voice and believes her. </p><p>“I don’t know what I did to trick you into believing this but you’re wrong. I’m not.”</p><p>“You didn’t trick me into believing anything, you <b>are </b>a good person. You are the one who kept me company when my husband would leave me alone every chance he got. You are the person who would treat me with kindness and respect when everyone else in your family treated me like crap the second it was clear that Alex didn’t care about me anymore. You were the one who told me the truth when everyone else was probably more than comfortable to lie to me.”</p><p>“I told you the day you decided to leave him.”</p><p>“You told me the day you realized I didn’t know. It just happened to be the same day. And you told me because you are a good person. My own husband didn’t tell me even though I could have been killed but the moment you realized I didn’t know, you told me. Because you are a good person."</p><p>“I’m not.”</p><p>“You are. You’re a good person, the best person in your family for sure and a good person as a whole. And you deserve better than a life beating yourself up for things you did when you were too young to fully understand them, you deserve better than to stay with a woman who does not love you. You deserve to be happy, Daniel.”</p><p>He gets up suddenly and turns his back on her. The only light in the room comes from the streetlight so it takes a moment for Grace to see the tears on his cheeks. Suddenly, he gets up and starts to look for his clothes. She lets him, feeling so exhausted, feeling like nothing she could say would make him stay. She doesn’t move or doesn’t say a word, knowing that if she does, she will start to cry. When he is dressed, he comes back to her and kisses her forehead. It lasts a few seconds too long, it's so heartbreakingly tender that it makes it feel like a goodbye and she hates it. </p><p>“I’m sorry,” he says and with everything, she doesn’t even know what exactly he is sorry for. </p><p>He leaves and she cries herself to sleep. </p><hr/><p>The next day, she thinks about texting him. She unlocks her phone and opens the conversation. She types sentences and erases them almost immediately. She wonders if he is doing the same, seeing the three little dots appearing and disappearing as she tries to figure out what to say. Eventually, she just gives up.</p><p>She continues to do this for days. She opens the conversation, her last message to him almost taunting her, daring her to say something else but nothing comes. Days go by and she still comes back to those stupid messages she can’t send. </p><p>After a week, she is alone again in her apartment, thinking about how, just a week prior, she was in his arms and the world felt right. And now here she is, alone again in her tiny home. It’s late and she is tired after all the tears she cried the past week and she finally finds the words to text him. </p><p>
  <em> Everyone always leaves me. I don’t know why I thought you would be the one to stay.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I wish I could hate you for leaving. It would be so much easier. But I don’t. I could never hate you. Not when I feel the exact opposite.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I wasn’t lying when I said you deserved better than be miserable for the rest of your life. I hope one day you’ll believe me.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Maybe then you’ll come back to me. </em>
</p><hr/><p>A month passes and she doesn’t hear from him. Sometimes, when she is alone at night in her tiny apartment, she fixes the last messages she sent him as if fixing them is going to make him respond. She thinks she should move on but truly, she isn’t ready for that. At some point, she did try. She downloaded tinder and even talked to a guy for a while but really, it’s hard to focus on dating when she is still in love with someone else. So she deleted the app and for now, it is what it is. </p><p>On a Friday night, she went out with some friends. They watched a dumb movie and ate outside. It was a nice evening and Grace had two cocktails, which is not nearly enough to get her drunk but is more than enough to get her buzzed and giddy. She feels good when she gets home. </p><p>There is someone in front of the apartment building. She doesn’t really think twice about it, maybe they are visiting someone or maybe something else. But when she gets closer, she feels something in her stomach, like she knows the person, like she can recognize him even though he is not facing her, like she can recognize his hair and his frame and his everything. She doesn’t let herself hope and gets closer. Then, he turns and she sees him, breathtakingly beautiful and very much here and she feels very sober suddenly. </p><p>“Daniel?” she says tentatively, slowly, like she is talking to a wounded animal who could run at any big movement from her part. </p><p>“Hi,” he says and a small smile appears on his face. “I was here to see you but you weren’t here, obviously.”</p><p>She doesn’t say a word, she opens the door and wordlessly invites him in and he follows her. </p><p>Once inside, she gets a glass of water for herself and offers him a beer. He declines the beer but asks for a glass of water instead and she gives it to him. She doesn’t ask why he doesn’t drink. She doesn’t ask him why he is here. He came here without her saying a word, it’s his turn to speak. He drinks his water all at once and then, finally, he speaks. </p><p>“So, you’re probably wondering why I am here?”</p><p>She raises an eyebrow as if she was saying <em> you don’t say </em> but there is a shadow of a smile on her lips and he chuckles. It’s such a sweet sound coming from him. </p><p>“Well, first of all, I own you an apology, for leaving you last time and for not responding to your text. They <em> broke </em> me you know, knowing that I was the one who hurt you.”</p><p>“You give yourself a lot of credit. Fosters kids remember? Abandonment issues are part of the deal.”</p><p>“Still, I’m sorry.”</p><p>She doesn’t tell him it’s fine because really, it was not fine. She is not mad at him but she wouldn’t say it was fine. </p><p>“I looked into it you know. About what you said. I hired a private investigator and I looked into it.”</p><p>“Really?”</p><p>“Yeah. Eventually, I found someone who married into a family like mine and almost died on her wedding night. She obviously didn’t. She said the family exploded at sunrise.”</p><p>“So I guess it means it’s all true?”</p><p>“You do not sound that surprised for someone who believes it’s complete and utter nonsense,” he says playfully. </p><p>She shrugs. Maybe despite her better judgment, she did believe it was real. She did spend an awful lot of time reading about it for someone who thinks it’s nonsense after all. </p><p>“I also found a guy who got out. Who was born in this kind of family and got out.”</p><p>That picks her interest. “And?”</p><p>“I think you are right. About having to give up everything to get out. It’s what this guy did. And then, he got married without following any weird familial tradition and he is still alive to tell the tale.”</p><p>“And what does that mean for you?” she asks as she takes a sip of her water. </p><p>“I told Charity I want a divorce.”</p><p>She almost chokes on her water. “What? When?”</p><p>He looks at his watch and says: “Hum, like 4 or 5 hours ago.”</p><p>“Wow.”</p><p>“Yeah. It was not an easy conversation and she threw me out of my apartment but I don’t want to stay there anyway. And I had nowhere to go and I missed you so I thought maybe…”</p><p>“Yes,” she interrupts, sounding a bit eager but she doesn’t find in her the energy to care. “You can stay here tonight, tomorrow, forever, as long as you want.”</p><p>He smiles and he closes the distance between them, takes her face in his hand and kisses her. It’s not like the other night, it’s slow and soft and tender, he kisses her like someone who knows he has all the time in the world.</p><p>“By the way,” he says in between kisses. “I just thought you should know: I love you.”</p><p>“I love you too,” she says with the brightest smile on her lips. </p><p>He smiles and kisses her again. They kiss for a while until Grace decides she wants more, so she takes his hand and leads him to her bedroom. </p><hr/><p>As it turns out, just saying that he wants a divorce is the first step of a long and tedious process. Obviously, Charity didn’t waste any time, calling Alex and the entire Le Domas family about it. The next day, they are woken up by every member of his family calling him to ask him if he is being serious. At first, they are acting like a nice and understanding family: yes, they know and understand that his marriage with Charity has its “ups and downs” but is he really willing to throw it all away for no apparent reasons? Even <em> Alex </em> acts like he doesn’t know why Daniel could possibly want to leave Charity as if they weren’t still having an affair. When it becomes obvious that Daniel isn’t going to be persuaded by their fake compassion, they try to remind him of his duty as a Le Domas son. They also try to remind him about the deal and how Charity being out of the family could destroy them all. </p><p>“I don’t care,” Daniel would say. “I don’t want to be part of this family anymore. Charity can go and marry Alex for all I care, problem solved.”</p><p>When this method doesn’t work, they try to threaten him by cutting him off, taking all his money away, firing him from his job and Daniel laughs at their faces, telling them that it was his plan anyway and that they are more than free to do so. Grace listens to the whole thing, Daniel putting the family on speakerphone and she can’t pretend she doesn’t find it hilarious. </p><p>He gets a call from Charity during the first week, telling him that he can come to pick his things whenever he wants. They agree on Saturday because unlike him, Grace is working and he is going to need her help if he wants to be done with it as quickly as possible. When they arrive together, Charity looks at them, clearly surprised to see her and then, she starts to laugh bitterly. </p><p>“You two are a bunch of fucking hypocrites, making a fuss about me and Alex when you are not any better.”</p><p>Grace is more than happy to let her say whatever she wants because she frankly doesn’t give a shit. She knows she has the moral high ground here: she was not married when she decided to pursue a romantic relationship with Daniel and while Daniel was, at least, he was not having sex with his brother’s wife (his ex-wife, but considering how said wedding ended, she doesn’t think he has any reason to feel guilty about it). So really, Charity’s words mean nothing to her. Clearly, Daniel doesn’t have her restraint. </p><p>“Oh yeah, you having sex with my married brother, me being with a very single woman, definitively the same situation.”</p><p>“Well, she is your brother’s ex-wife.”</p><p>“Well, <em> she </em> is right here and does not like it when people talk about her like she isn’t,” Grace says. Daniel looks apologetically at her but Charity obviously doesn’t care. </p><p>“You can try to pretend you are so much better than me,” she says, “but here you are, breaking my marriage and sleeping with my husband. You don’t have the moral high ground here.”</p><p>“I am a single woman who can do whatever she wants. And considering your marriage, it’s safe to say that I probably didn’t break much. A legal piece of paper does not make you a couple. And Daniel is his own person and can make his own decision.”</p><p>“And what I want to do is pack my things and leave,” Daniel says. He grabs Grace’s hand and leads her toward the dressing room. Of course, this rich jerk has a separated room for his clothes. </p><p>Packing takes the whole day. Daniel doesn’t want to take everything, considering that Grace’s apartment is pretty small and also that the entire point is to start a simpler life. He leaves his ridiculously fancy suits that cost more than her rent, looking almost sad, which amuses her and she doesn’t hesitate to let him know. He pretends to be offended but he is smiling too. He packs his regular clothes and his “bad suits”, the ones he would wear for occasions that demand a suit but where you are going to do things that will potentially ruin them (apparently, it’s a real thing you have to think about when you buy a suit). He explains all of this to her while they pack.</p><p>“Fucking rich people”, she mutters, because really, she can’t think of anything else. He laughs. </p><p>Daniel takes his laptop, a blanket that an old friend gave him when he was in college (apparently, the friend knit it herself and it was a very thoughtful gift that he still cherishes to this day) and a few books that are his. He tells Charity that she can do whatever she wants with the rest and they leave. </p><p>Daniel gets the divorce papers ready in record time. Grace introduces him to her old lawyer and the poor man looks very confused when Daniel says that everything he owns will go to his wife. The lawyer tries to argue, telling him he doesn’t have to since <em> he </em> signed a prenup but Daniel shrugs it off and promises to ask for enough money to pay him quite generously, which is enough for the lawyer to stop arguing. It’s clearly not enough to convince him that Daniel isn’t insane though. </p><p>Charity signs the divorce paper quickly. She would be crazy not to, considering that she gets off really easily here. She does try to involve the family one last time to convince Daniel to change his mind. The Le Domas are not happy with Daniel and are being pretty clear about this, but Daniel doesn’t change his position and after a while, Daniel just blocks their number. That’s when they start to call Grace, who really has only herself to blame for not changing her number after the divorce. They are all being their charming self, calling her all sorts of names for daring to take their Daniel away from them. She blows up and yells at them.</p><p>“You never fucking cared about him! You treat him like shit, you don’t respect him! You didn’t even take his side when Charity and Alex continued their affair in the open, you actually treat them like a couple <em> in front of Daniel </em>, which, even considering how bad their marriage was, is still fucking insanely cruel. You treat him like a worthless piece of shit and now that he finally realized that his left hand has more value than your entire family combined, you want him back? Maybe if you cared so much, you should have shown him before it was too late. Now you better stop calling me or I’m going to the police for harassment.”</p><p>It feels pretty good to tell them off after everything. She barely has time to block their number before Daniel slams her into the nearest wall, kisses her senseless and says:</p><p>“That was the hottest thing I have ever seen in my entire life.”</p><p>She giggles as he takes her to bed. </p><hr/><p>It would have made sense for them to live on their own at the beginning of their relationship. Sure, they know each other pretty well and it’s easy to fall into a routine with him, especially after all those weekend they spent together when she was still Grace Le Domas. But still, their relationship is fresh and space would make sense but it’s not how they do it. At first, he stays with her because it’s the only option he has: he has no one but her, he doesn’t have money and he doesn’t have a job. She is the one providing for both of them, which she doesn’t mind, especially since he doesn’t ask for much. He pays her back by cooking and cleaning the flat while he is looking for a job. He wants to start to put his share once he works but Grace knows he won’t be able to because he has so many things to do first. He has to buy more appropriate work clothes, he has to open a bank account, he has to start to save up some money… It would take months for him before he can live on his own. Then, he finds a job as an accountant in a small firm. They are reluctant to hire him at first, because he used to be CFO for a huge company and that’s a clear downgrade and they fear that he is going to be too expensive for them to afford but eventually, Daniel is the best candidate and he asks for a reasonable price, so he gets the job. He tells her later that he jokingly told them that the downgrade in salary was because he owed his old job to nepotism, so it was a family bonus or something like that. Apparently, they thought it was funny. Then he tells her that they asked him why he was not going for a bigger job as the CFO of some multinational, which was the kind of job he had. </p><p>“The truth is, I hated that job. I worked too much, it felt like I never had a moment for myself and as a CFO, I had too much administrative bullshit and too little actual accounting, which sucks because maths are fun.”</p><p>“Nerd,” she says with a soft smile and he smiles back. </p><p>After a few months at his job, which he clearly loves, he could look for his own place but at this point, they have their routine. He wakes up half an hour before her and will make coffee and breakfast. They will eat their breakfast together, sometimes talking but most of the time in comfortable silence, Grace reading the news on her tablet and Daniel reading some financial newspaper because he is a nerd who loves math. He will leave first, because the commute to his workplace is an hour-long, while she only has a fifteen-minute walk to the school. She will kiss him goodbye. Usually, they will text during their lunch break. When she gets home, she will grade some student work and clean the flat or go groceries shopping. By the time he gets home, they will chill on the couch for a while and then, one of them will prepare their dinner (he is the better cook but she isn’t terrible either, so it really depends on who had the best day), eat while they talk about their day. After dinner, they will watch a movie or read a book or play a game or have sex, or more than one of those activities, depending on their mood. It’s terribly domestic and dreadfully boring and Grace loves every second of it. So really, even when he could move out, he doesn’t bring it up and she doesn’t ask him to. She likes what they have, it’s cozy and intimate. She feels like they never went through the wild passion new lovers have, where they feel invincible and the whole world belongs to them and nothing could stop them. There is passion of course, but there is also something quieter in the way they love each other. Alex loved grand gestures, which were fun sometimes but mostly, they were exhausting. Everything about Alex was to show her and the whole world that he loved her. Daniel’s love is quieter and most important, it’s for her and her alone to enjoy. It’s in the way he never leaves to work without kissing her. It’s in the way sometimes he will bring her a flower when he gets home just because he felt like it. It’s in the way sometimes she is cooking or reading or doing something and he will come behind her and softly kiss her shoulder or her cheek or her head before going back to whatever he was about to do. She loves it that way. She feels it means a lot more when he does it for her because she knows it means he is not trying to prove something to anyone. He does it because he wants to. He does it for <em> her </em>. She loves her life the way it is right now. So no, she doesn’t ask him to get his own place. She likes it more when he is around and she likes how easily they learned to live together.</p><p>Daniel becomes friends with some of his coworkers and he reconnects with some of his old college friends (including his ex Ethan and Marlene, the girl who gave him the blanket) and eventually, she gets to meet them. She introduces him to her friends too, her coworkers Clara and Sam. She also reintroduces him to Claudia and Audrey, who used to be Alex’s friends as well and were the only one to take her side during the divorce. In all cases, there is something pretty awkward to explain that they met through her ex-husband, his brother. She wins over his friend easily, the weirdness of their circumstances feeling less weird after an explanation for those people who weren’t there back then. It’s weirder with her friends, who were all invited to the wedding but Daniel wins her friends over easily because he is charming. Even Claudia and Audrey, who remember him as the drunk brother at her wedding warm up to him. </p><p>“He used to be a mess,” Claudia said. “But now, he seems pretty normal.”</p><p>“And sober,” Audrey adds. </p><p>“Yeah, and he clearly adores you. He looks at you like you are the best, most incredible person on the planet. And you look really happy.”</p><p>“And he seems sober,” Audrey repeats. </p><p>Daniel would be pleased by that comment, Grace thinks, because he has been trying very hard to stay sober since they started dating and he is doing a good job overall. She is very proud of him for it. </p><p>A little more than a year after his divorce, they move into their new apartment. Now that Daniel has been working for a while, he has enough money saved to allow them to upgrade their living condition and a bigger flat sounds very nice. Their new apartment is in Brooklyn, not very far from the old one. It’s on the 3rd floor, which Grace prefers even if there is no elevator. The kitchen is separated this time and it’s not very big, but it’s a decent size for cooking and for two people so it’s good enough as far as they’re concerned. The living room is a tiny bit bigger, mostly thanks to the window seat (which might have been the thing that made Grace fall in love, she has been dreaming of one of those since she was a kid). They have a real bedroom, big enough for a bed and a dresser for two. And they have a third room, which they use as an office/guest room for now but they both know that one day, it will be a kid’s room. They didn’t talk about it a lot because their relationship is still young and definitively too young for a child, but they talked about it. It’s more a project for a not too distant future but they both agreed that they do want children and that they want to adopt. Grace does not want to be pregnant and has always wanted to adopt and because Daniel doesn’t want any child to have his Le Domas gene. They talk about it the day they made an offer for the flat when they are lying in bed and are making plans for the future and he mentioned that the child will never have his last name. </p><p>“I mean, who would want to be associated with such a family name?”</p><p>“It’s yours,” she points out with a teasing voice.</p><p>“My biggest flaw, I’m well aware,” he says sardonically.</p><p>“Well, it doesn’t have to be your last name.”</p><p>He chuckles. “Any suggestion then?”</p><p>“You could take mine,” she says in a serious tone.</p><p>It takes him a second to catch the meaning of her words and then, he turns to her, looking at her with a sombre look.</p><p>“Grace…”</p><p>“Why not?”</p><p>“It would sound ridiculous. Daniel Johnson, it sounds like a fake name.”</p><p>“Sounds good to me.”</p><p>“Grace…” he says again like he is pleading with her to stop the conversation there, while it isn’t too serious and they don’t have to go into the real, important reasons. But Grace is nothing if not stubborn.</p><p>“Come on, give me a good reason,” she says and it sounds like a challenge. </p><p>“You know why.”</p><p>She knows his reason, of course, she has been with him the past year. She has been the one to comfort him after every nightmare, holding him back to sleep. She has been the one to witness all the times he has feared that maybe he was still a Le Domas, bound to a deal made by an ancestor who thought that being rich was worth putting a curse on his whole family. She knows, but she also remembers that the reason he is here now is that he found enough reason to believe there was a way out of it. </p><p>“You said that guy you met got married after and it was fine.”</p><p>“Yes, but what if I didn’t do enough? If it was just me, it would be one thing, but I won’t risk your life on a maybe.”</p><p>“So what is the alternative? We spend our lives being scared of something that might not even be true? We don’t let ourselves enjoy ourselves and be happy?”</p><p>“We don’t have to be married to be happy,” he says.</p><p>He makes a face like he is a little hurt by this comment so she closes the distance between them so that she is sitting on him and says: “And I am really happy with you. I’m just saying that I would not be opposed to us getting married and if you really don’t want to, it’s fine but if you do, you shouldn’t feel like we can’t because of this since, if it’s true, we <em> dealt </em> with it already.”</p><p>He nods and lightly kisses her, but he seems distracted. That doesn’t surprise her. She knows him so well, sometimes it’s almost like she could read his mind. She knows a part of him still feels guilty about everything, a part of him feels like he could do more, that whatever he does to better himself, it will never be enough to truly make up the fact that he was born in his family. A part of him feels that being born a Le Domas is an offence he can’t do anything about. Grace thinks this is a feeling that will never go away, that feeling of not deserving to be happy the way he wants to. And she also knows there is no point in insisting on this, she made her point and she won’t make all of this disappear today, so she decides to lighten the mood up.</p><p>“Also, if you take my name, people who read tabloids will stop asking you if you’re <em> Daniel Le Domas, from that rich family drama </em>,” she says with a silly voice. It’s been an inside joke since the day someone told them he read about him in some magazine. </p><p>(The truth is, it infuriated her that the family twisted the whole story to make it sound like Daniel is the asshole who left his charming perfect wife for some woman and trying to make it look like Charity and Alex’s marriage is a sweet story of a guy standing up for the woman who was wronged by all this. It infuriates her that they would throw Daniel under the bus like that, even if it’s not really a surprise. And no matter how many time Daniel will tell her he doesn’t care and actually thinks it’s really funny, it still makes her blood boil with fury.)</p><p>He laughs at her silly antics and turns her around so that she is the one lying on the bed and he is the one above her. He kisses her tenderly.</p><p>“I’ll think about it,” he says.</p><hr/><p>It’s been a few months since they moved in and it is Grace’s last day before Winter’s break. She loves her job, she really does and she loves her kids but teaching on the last day before Christmas’ break is exactly what Grace imagines hell must feel like. Those kids can be actual angels sometimes but right before Christmas, they are a bunch small demons: they can’t stay in place, they can’t focus on anything and even if she doesn’t even make them <em> work </em> because she knows a lost cause when she sees one, it’s still a relief when the day is over and they all leave. She doesn’t blame them of course, kids are always happy when they are about to get a break from school and when it’s Christmas’ break, they are even happier. She understands, they just want to be done with school to go home and watch Christmas movies with hot cocoa and fluffy socks. Hell, she is the teacher and there is nothing she wants more at this moment than this exact scenario. </p><p>When she gets home, she is surprised to see Daniel already there, considering that he usually gets home after her. The place is decorated with fairy lights and a few candles. Daniel is there, dressed up.</p><p>“What’s all this?” she asks.</p><p>“A surprise,” he says with a smile. “I felt like celebrating today. Also, I know that you probably had a long day and you deserve a nice night.” He goes to her to kiss her cheek and she feels very lucky to have him at this moment. </p><p>“You look really good,” she says. </p><p>“Thank you, but I’m sure it will look better on our bedroom floor tonight,” he says with a huge grin. She gently pushes him off.</p><p>“You’re so dumb,” she says with an amused smile. “I need a shower.”</p><p>“Of course milady.”</p><p>Ok, he is being weird. He is a dork, she knows that, but calling her milady is overkill, even for him. </p><p>“Are you okay?” she asks, her eyebrows furrowed. </p><p>“Yes, fine, totally fine! Why don’t you just go take your shower while I wait for our dinner? Food’s on the way, I ordered from our favorite Japanese take out.”</p><p>Yeah, he is definitively being weird but she doesn’t say anything else about it. Whatever it is, it will pass. “Ok weirdo”, she tells him and she kisses his cheek before going to the bedroom. She takes a long hot shower and puts on some clothes to match his. </p><p>Dinner is great. The food is delicious, as always and he seems more relaxed. They talk about their day, well, she kinda monopolizes the conversation, which isn’t very normal. Daniel can be pretty chatty and usually, the conversation is more balanced. She doesn’t think much about it, maybe he just had a very uneventful and boring day while she had a very eventful, entertaining and exhausting one. She almost forgets that he was being weird in the first place until dessert comes and he is acting strange again.</p><p>“What’s wrong?” </p><p>“What? Nothing’s wrong!”</p><p>“You are being weird and it’s kinda freaking me out,” she admits. </p><p>He opens his mouth like he is about to say something but closes it right away. He gets up and goes to her, looking for something in the pocket of his jacket, but it’s only when he drops on one knee that she suddenly realizes what is happening. He gets a ring out, a pretty simple, white gold band with small diamonds on it and on top, a round shape diamond. Grace loves it.</p><p>“I’m not being weird,” he says, “I’m just nervous. I have been thinking about what we talked about for months now and you are right.”</p><p>“I”m always right,” she says with a smile. She couldn’t help it.</p><p>“Please, don’t interrupt me while I’m proposing,” he says but his smile is clearly playful. God, she loves him so much. “As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted,” she rolls her eyes but she doesn’t think she has ever smiled as brightly as she does at this moment, “you were right. I keep letting the past get in the way of what would make me happy. I don’t want to do that anymore. I love you Grace, you are the most amazing woman I have ever met. You’re smart and funny and kind and the most stunning woman on the planet. Every day with you feels like a gift and I don’t know what I did to deserve it but I am so grateful to have you in my life. You saved me and you make me the happiest person on the planet and I want to spend the rest of my life making you just as happy. Grace, will you marry me?”</p><p>She is crying, which she didn’t even realize until now but she is smiling so hard it almost hurt. </p><p>“Yes,” she says. “Yes, a thousand times yes.”</p><p>She drops from her chair to meet him at his level and kisses him. They take a break between kisses so he can put the ring on her finger and go back to kissing right after. And Grace thinks she has never been happier in her entire life.</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>So, I hope you guys enjoyed the fic! It was very fun to write it! </p><p>This was technically beta-read (both by a friend of mine and Grammarly) but there might still be some mistakes since I'm not a native English speaker and neither is my friend. So if you notice anything, please let me know ^^</p><p>As usual, comments are always appreciated!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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